Art of Supply

"We are working this case, but no trucks were stolen. Just the cargo." — Montclair, California Police Department
On August 17th, someone with fake paperwork walked into an Anheuser-Busch distribution center in Montclair, California, and was handed a load of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Nobody broke in. Nobody stole a truck.
One hour later, they did it again - same process, same warehouse.
Within weeks, Pabst had a countdown clock, their CEO on TikTok, a $20,000 reward, and a sympathetic comment from KitKat. It's a great story. It's also an example of the logistics-based crime that cost shippers in the U.S. and Canada nearly $725 Million last year.
In this episode of Art of Supply, Kelly Barner covers:
- Why almost nothing in the Montclair pickup belonged to Pabst: not the building, not the truck, not the handoff
- How strategic cargo theft works, and why Pabst is in increasingly crowded company
- Whether a viral campaign should turn cargo theft into a punchline 
Links:
Inside the Rise of Cargo Theft (AOS, September 2026): https://artofprocurement.com/blog/supply-inside-the-rise-of-cargo-theft 
Tracking the Logistics of a $400K Lobster Heist (AOS, January 2026): https://artofprocurement.com/blog/supply-tracking-the-logistics-of-a-400k-lobster-heist 
Kelly Barner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelly-barner-6884443/ 
Art of Supply LinkedIn newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/art-of-supply-6895142546301960193 
Art of Supply on AOP: http://www.artofsupply.com 
Subscribe to the Art of Procurement Newsletter: https://resources.artofprocurement.com/art-of-procurement-podcast-subscribe

"IEEPA, in many ways, I called it the sledgehammer. It was like everything, everywhere, all at once." - Jeff Rittener, International Trade and Compliance Advisor, Rittener Trade Services
For more than 30 years, Jeff Rittener, International Trade and Compliance Advisor at Rittener Trade Services, built and led Intel's global trade organization.
Now he has his own consulting practice and podcast, Rittener Reflections, and is a Member of the Tesari AI National Security Council.
In this episode, Jeff walks Kelly Barner through the legal tools behind the current wave of tariffs, and what happens when one of them gets struck down by the Supreme Court.
LIsten in to hear Jeff and Kelly explore:
- Why the Supreme Court ruled the administration's IEEPA tariffs illegal, and what replaced them within hours
- Why Section 301 and Section 232 tariffs are built to last while others aren't
- The 1930s law now being used to hit Canada with a 50 percent tariff, and why one company is already relocating production because of it
- Why the IEEPA refund process favors large companies like Apple and Amazon over small importers
Links:
Jeff Rittener on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffrittener/ 
Rittener Reflections Podcast: https://rittenerreflections.com/ 
No Trade Is Free, Robert Lighthizer: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0063282135?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback 
Kelly Barner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelly-barner-6884443/ 
Art of Supply LinkedIn newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/art-of-supply-6895142546301960193 
Art of Supply on AOP: http://www.artofsupply.com 
Subscribe to the Art of Procurement Newsletter: https://resources.artofprocurement.com/art-of-procurement-podcast-subscribe

"I want your phone numbers, I want your internet domain, I want everything, your PO box, everything. Now I've become you." - Keith Lewis, Vice President of Operations at Verisk CargoNet
A purchased MC (motor carrier) number, sometimes bought for as little as $5,000, can turn a stranger into a fully credentialed trucking company overnight. It can make them look trustworthy enough that you hand them a truckload full of valuable inventory.
Keith Lewis, Vice President of Operations at Verisk CargoNet, spent 26 years in law enforcement before joining CargoNet's crime analyst unit, and in this episode he walks Kelly Barner through how cargo theft has evolved from truck-stop break-ins into an organized, border-spanning business chasing the highest-value freight in the network.
In this episode of the Art of Supply podcast, Keith and Kelly explore:
- Why a single load bound for an AI data center can be worth $20 to $30 million — and how that's changed what thieves target
- How purchased MC numbers and misdirected loads let criminals become "legitimate" carriers in a matter of days
- Why a $400,000 lobster theft and a $400,000 copper theft have completely different endings
- Why most stolen freight is never recovered, and the one document that determines whether it can be
Links:
Keith Lewis on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/keith-lewis-08b55817/ 
Kelly Barner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelly-barner-6884443/ 
Art of Supply LinkedIn newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/art-of-supply-6895142546301960193 
Art of Supply on AOP: http://www.artofsupply.com 
Subscribe to the Art of Procurement Newsletter: https://resources.artofprocurement.com/art-of-procurement-podcast-subscribe

"We are on borrowed time." - Army Major General John Ferrari
On July 20th, President Trump signed an executive order making it dramatically harder for defense contractors to buy critical materials from China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. Seven days later, the U.S. Army handed Ford and GM prototype contracts to build a new heavy infantry squad vehicle on the theory that Detroit can build trucks faster and cheaper than the traditional defense industrial base.
Nobody has explained how the new restrictions and speed expectations are supposed to work at the same time.
In this episode of the Art of Supply podcast, Kelly Barner covers:
- What the U.S. Army asked Ford and GM for and what the new sourcing rules now forbid them from buying to build it
- Why a bomber plant outside Ypsilanti is the most useful data point in this story, and why the lesson everyone takes from it is backwards
- The second rulebook already two years into the same experiment that might give us an early look at what to expect here
 
Links:
Kelly Barner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelly-barner-6884443/ 
Art of Supply LinkedIn newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/art-of-supply-6895142546301960193 
Art of Supply on AOP: http://www.artofsupply.com 
Subscribe to the Art of Procurement Newsletter: https://resources.artofprocurement.com/art-of-procurement-podcast-subscribe

"When the government starts collecting money as a tax, they don't normally give it back." — Curtis Spencer, CEO, IMS Worldwide
For most of the last sixty years, the average U.S. tariff rate was two and a half percent. Duty was a rounding error, and import networks got designed accordingly. 
Curtis Spencer, CEO of IMS Worldwide, says the floor is now 20 percent, and plenty of importers are still treating that like weather that will pass.
He has spent more than four decades in foreign-trade zones. When he started, the United States had twelve of them. Customs is about to issue number 302.
In this episode of Art of Supply, Kelly Barner and Curtis Spencer discuss:
- Why the business case for an FTZ went from 2- or 3-to-1 to 10-to-1 without the paperwork getting any harder
-  What "substantial transformation" means now that customs is chasing country of origin into second- and third-tier suppliers
-  The 1 percent of cases where a bonded warehouse beats a zone, and how to tell whether you are in it
Links:
Curtis Spencer on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/curtis-spencer-0a553010/ 
Kelly Barner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelly-barner-6884443/ 
Art of Supply LinkedIn newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/art-of-supply-6895142546301960193 
Art of Supply on AOP: http://www.artofsupply.com 
Subscribe to the Art of Procurement Newsletter: https://resources.artofprocurement.com/art-of-procurement-podcast-subscribe